2-for-1: Can Windows 8 satisfy both the desktop and the tablet?

Microsoft gave itself a tremendous challenge: Produce an operating system to …

Microsoft presented itself an enormous task when it started development of Windows 8: Produce an operating system that could go toe-to-toe with iOS and Android in the touch-driven tablet space while still preserving the value of Windows' considerable history on the desktop.

This complex problem has challenged Microsoft for about two decades. For 20 years the company tried to ship touch-driven (generally stylus-driven) tablets that used the conventional Windows front-end, hoping a smattering of extra utilities—an on-screen keyboard that floated over the Windows UI, boxes to contain handwriting—would be enough to convert a mouse-driven operating system into a tablet platform.

These tablet machines never achieved substantial success. Apple's iOS, first released in 2007, demonstrated that touch machines could find enormous success as long as their interface was sympathetic to both the constraints imposed by touch—imprecision, obstruction of the view—and its novel capabilities. Before Windows 7 was finished (and before Apple had even announced plans to produce an iOS-running tablet) Microsoft started work on developing such a user interface for Windows.

The result of that work is Windows 8. Over the last few days we've given the Consumer Preview a thorough examination. The operating system has plenty of new features and improvements that we'll cover in the coming weeks and months. But as interesting and important as these changes are, they are small fry until one fundamental question has been answered: Has Microsoft truly succeeded in squaring the circle? Does Windows 8 genuinely have an interface that is equally effective for users of traditional input devices and touch machines? Is Windows 8 an operating system for tablets and desktops alike?

The tablet as a PC

Microsoft didn't deviate from the position it asserted over those many years of poor tablet sales. For Redmond, the tablet is not a category apart form the PC. Tablets are "a sort of PC," albeit one usually lacking a mouse and keyboard, gaining a touch screen in their stead. The new user interface it had to develop for Windows would respect this position. Built to enable touch-screen tablet computing, but also effective with traditional PC input devices. The goal was to produce an interface that was all things to all people.

To cater to the needs of touch users, Microsoft went back to the drawing board. Those stalwarts of traditional user interfaces, Windows, Icons, Menus, and Pointers, have been left behind in favor of a new design concept called Metro. The Metro aesthetic calls for simple shapes, crisp and high quality text, then careful use of juxtaposition and layout to convey information. Ultimately: visual simplification.

Traditional interfaces are chock full of artifice—3D-effect buttons drawn to look as if they "stand out" from the background and get "pushed in" when you click them, inlaid panels, chunky window buttons, and more. Metro discards these. They're all essentially unnecessary. We computer-users are experienced enough to know an icon or a piece of text that's colored differently from the surrounding text is probably interactive. It will do something when we tap or click it. The ornamentation isn't conveying useful information any more.

Armed with the Metro idea, Microsoft built a new shell for Windows codenamed "Modern Shell" or "MoSh." Along with the new Metro shell are new Metro applications, both first- and third-party, so that applications and operating system alike are built for touch.

Modern Shell basics

You'd better get used to seeing this.

The centerpiece of the Windows 8 is the Start screen. This is a big, bold, brightly-colored full-screen application launcher/system dashboard, packed with neatly organized tiles. Unlike the icons in the Start menu, the Start menu's code has been at least partially removed from the operating system. There will be no simple registry hacks to reinstate it—the tiles in the Start screen are living things. These live tiles keep themselves up-to-date. The Mail tile does not simply start the mail program, it shows how many unread mails you have. The Weather tile shows the current conditions.

Tapping any one of those tiles launches the corresponding application.

New-style Metro applications, like the Start screen, are also full-screen. For all Metro's aesthetic differences, it's the windows—specifically, the lack of windows—that are most striking. The resizable, overlapping, movable boxes with their title bars and borders and menus that have defined the historic Windows user interface—all gone. Metro apps, like the iOS apps Apple has been so successful with, are full-screen, edge-to-edge affairs. Every single pixel is dedicated to the app. When an app is running, the operating system doesn't merely take a back seat: it disappears entirely.

On systems with a respectable resolution (1366×768 or higher), in addition to the full-screen view there is a split-screen mode. The split is fixed and asymmetric. Two applications can be shown at one time. One takes up the majority of the screen, the other is constrained to a narrow ("snapped") sidebar.

Messaging snapped alongside Weather.

As well as being full-screen, apps also work a little differently than they used to. Instead of conventional toolbars and context menus, every application can provide an "app bar." It's a strip of commands along the bottom of the screen. These remain hidden until called into view with a swipe or a click. Application configuration is also handled in a new way; it's performed from the charms bar.

The charms bar is an always-accessible set of five icons that appear down the right hand edge of the screen. From top to bottom, these icons are Search, Share, Start, Devices, and Settings. Start is the easiest to handle as it simply takes you to the Start screen. Search is used to initiate searches, both of built-in things (files, programs, settings) and applications that register themselves as being searchable. Share allows the content of the current application to be shared in some way with other applications (for example, a Flickr browser might allow URLs to be "shared" with other programs, and a mail client might opt to receive such shared content).

Charms on the desktop.

Devices allows certain configuration of and connection to other devices. For example, a DLNA networked music player might be listed in the Devices charm, allowing a music application to easily send music over the network to the device. Settings contains configuration for both the system as a whole and the currently running application.

The final interface concept new to Windows 8 is "semantic zoom." Applications that present long, grouped lists (including the Start screen itself) allow the user to zoom out to gain a bird's eye view of the list. This zoom doesn't simply make the list items smaller; they actually change to become simpler and make the group names more prominent. For example, semantic zooming the Start screen replaces the live tiles and text with simple icons for each tile.

you didn't address the most important issue. Do users actually want a unified tablet and desktop OS? I'm guessing a lot of users would prefer two seperate OS, especially power users that do media content creation , software development, financial analysis or other tasks that do require many concurrent windows. If Microsoft really doesn't release a proper enterprise windows 8 without metro they I predict those users will stay with windows 7 as long as they can and may well end up changing to Mac or Linux when they can't use Windows 7 anymore.

Having had the chance to play around with the developer preview and now the consumer preview, I must say that Windows 8 feels disjointed. Windows and Microsoft have had an issue for quite a while with look and feel being consistent, and this new OS exacerbates the issues. It looks like two totally different OSes. If Microsoft is going to force me, a desktop user, to use a tablet interface to use their new OS, they could at least standardize the design. The Explorer ribbon is ugly also, IMO. It may sound trite, but if I am going to stare at a screen for hours each day, it may as well look good.

I'm an OS X user but have been using Window8 quite a bit since day 1 of the developer preview. I must say that some of my early qualms have been answered with the consumer preview. I'm finding the gestures natural on my Apple touchpad since they have been a part of OS X for a while and are integral to Lion and its successor. MS should be pleased with this reinvention of some of Windows, at least thus far. I hope it continues to evolve and that more and more of the old Windows 7 interface is deprecated.

I would prefer easier gestures, like a multi finger swipe to navigate between apps, and hope this replaces the somewhat cumbersome navigation now.

One query though, are hot corners new to Windows or have they been around for awhile?

I just spent several days with it on my laptop, via the customer preview. And I just really don't like it. Very clunky and cumbersome to me. I can see where it might be fine for a tablet or a phone. But it just doesn't work very well on a desktop.

I love(d) Windows 7. For the first time in many years I actually felt like Microsoft was "getting it". Seven, at least on my systems, runs extremely well - all the way from my multi-monitor work/gaming pc to my 7 Professional netbook.

I've tried the previews of Windows 8 (in VMs) and I don't know how I could be more disappointed. If Metro was something you could just disable, I would be completely fine. However, the "classic" desktop in 8 is a poor facsimile to a real desktop environment.

I still am really excited for the prospect of an x86 Windows 8 tablet, but I have lost all hope for it on the desktop.

I guess the amount of time I spend in my Linux installations is going to go way up.

Like many others, I find W8 "clunky and cumbersome", especially if I need to use the Desktop at all (even on my home/play PC).

If they work a bit more on a more seamless experience between Metro and Aero, and make it a fluid and intuitive experience for those of us who are a little bit slow , and work a little more on the integration between the two (i.e. settings, favourites, etc are present and change in sync in both Aero and Metro) then I'll be much happier.

Perhaps a half screen Start Menu? Or keep the Start button for old codgers like me on laptops/desktops. Or maybe just give it a few more swoopy animations that bring a feeling of cohesiveness.

Also: how do I easily turn off or hibernate my computer from the Start Screen or the Charms/Settings?

Multitasking is also a little clunky for me, the concept of hot corners is nice and the app pane underneath works nicely on a tablet but something like Expose would be appreciated, or something that acts as a cross between the Windows Phone 8 task switcher and Expose.

A little more consideration and refinement is necessary, especially for desktop users; wholesale changes won't make it any better I think as the foundations are generally solid, so on the whole, I'm 60% sold in Windows 8

I love(d) Windows 7. For the first time in many years I actually felt like Microsoft was "getting it". Seven, at least on my systems, runs extremely well - all the way from my multi-monitor work/gaming pc to my 7 Professional netbook.

I've tried the previews of Windows 8 (in VMs) and I don't know how I could be more disappointed. If Metro was something you could just disable, I would be completely fine. However, the "classic" desktop in 8 is a poor facsimile to a real desktop environment.

I still am really excited for the prospect of an x86 Windows 8 tablet, but I have lost all hope for it on the desktop.

I guess the amount of time I spend in my Linux installations is going to go way up.

I've always preferred OS X to Windows or Linux. But with 7 I thought they were really close, and starting to pull it together. Windows 8 is a step backward for desktop/laptop computers. I do think it will be a good tablet OS, and offer a real product differentiation from iOS.

I haven't used the preview yet, and I'm honestly not sure if I will for a while. But seriously, there's only one reason I still use Windows as opposed to Ubuntu or some other Linux alternative, and that's because I love PC gaming. So obviously, my only real worry about this whole Metro insanity, is what effect is it going to have on PC gaming? I REALLY REALLY hope it doesn't end up dumbing it down to console, or god forbid even worse, mobile gaming standards! I don't think I'll ever understand how people can call a game on their phone "good". It's tiny, and your fingers are in the way so you can't hardly see anything when your controlling it, and don't get me started on the ridiculous tilt controls. Those are as bad or worse in my opinion. I realize iOS and Apple have been a big hit, and Android has followed to some extent, but just because so much of the population at large is made up of sheep, I hope those of use with some appreciation of gaming can still count on Windows for entertainment.

I could deal with everything else. Why would there not be a control panel option that just let you switch the default load into the desktop with a Win7ish Start Menu? How hard could that really have been to do? I've had the 8 Dev and now Consumer previews in VM's and have spend about 40 hours with each. I really do not care for Charms or Hot Corners at all.

I don't mind their Xbox-esque metro front page. Its fine. But give me my desktop or I'm not biting.

I've tried the previews of Windows 8 (in VMs) and I don't know how I could be more disappointed. If Metro was something you could just disable, I would be completely fine. However, the "classic" desktop in 8 is a poor facsimile to a real desktop environment.

I really don't get this. Because the start menu is now full screen the entire desktop environment doesn't work anymore?

Having used the CP...I don't know how you came to that conclusion. And actually the new multi-monitor features, better task manager, new right-click menu in the bottom left hot corner etc. are all wonderful improvements to the desktop.

I agree that there's a lack of cohesiveness between Metro and "classic" and that Win8 definitely needs another layer of polish, but I see nothing but improvements to the desktop itself.

I haven't used the preview yet, and I'm honestly not sure if I will for a while. But seriously, there's only one reason I still use Windows as opposed to Ubuntu or some other Linux alternative, and that's because I love PC gaming. So obviously, my only real worry about this whole Metro insanity, is what effect is it going to have on PC gaming? I REALLY REALLY hope it doesn't end up dumbing it down to console, or god forbid even worse, mobile gaming standards! I don't think I'll ever understand how people can call a game on their phone "good". It's tiny, and your fingers are in the way so you can't hardly see anything when your controlling it, and don't get me started on the ridiculous tilt controls. Those are as bad or worse in my opinion. I realize iOS and Apple have been a big hit, and Android has followed to some extent, but just because so much of the population at large is made up of sheep, I hope those of use with some appreciation of gaming can still count on Windows for entertainment.

Probably you'll install games and then play them? It's still Windows, even if the start menu changed...

edit: sorry for the snark - it it helps, the first thing I did on the CP was install Steam and then install a game and play it. It's identical to Win7.

I know that personally, using the preview of windows 8, I constantly felt like I was using two separate operating systems- Windows, then Metro. The metro apps were beautiful, and smooth, but what good are they to me if I can't look at images located on my hard drive with them, or play songs from my file server? For this, I was forced to fall back onto the desktop OS, using the 'old' applications I am currently using for windows 7.

It looks like they can access the file system, as I was able to force-open a picture from my hard drive into the metro application, but I couldn't then move to the next image in the folder.

If the behavior for this doesn't change between now and the final release, I don't see ANY reason to upgrade from 7 to 8. I'll just end up spending almost all my time using the machine in the desktop 'app', anyway, and there just isn't enough changes there to make it worth the money.

Thank you Peter for mentioning my concerns about the hot corners on multi-monitor setups and the search feature not defaulting to "all" scope (requiring more clicks/keys to get to non-apps results than it takes on Win7), two of my biggest gripes so far. However, one thing you didn't mention at all which has been a major thought of mine: WHY should I be interested in running Metro apps on my desktop PC at all? They are unnecessarily full screen and waste tons of screen real estate. This is something you must understand given your triple 1920x1200 setup. In the Window Store, for example, there is vast amounts of empty white space, and I have to go to the charms bar to search the store or right-click to see the app bar. This makes no sense considering there's plenty of space to show these functions persistently. The full screen or even split screen setup is not nearly as conducive to multitasking as several windows on large monitors are. And this goes for the task bar as well. It allows for one click multitasking. The sidebar takes more effort, and is unnecessary when again, there is so much wasted space on my screen.

This all just goes to show that Metro was designed for tablets in mind and not desktops in the slightest. In might work for most users and for laptops with smallish screens, but I'm not seeing why I'd want to use it on my desktop. And for that reason, Win8 has very little appeal over Win7 for the moment.

you didn't address the most important issue. Do users actually want a unified tablet and desktop OS? I'm guessing a lot of users would prefer two seperate OS, ...

That's my feeling... I like my iPad for being an iPad and I like my Mac for being a Mac. I don't want them to conflate too much.

Give it another year or two... It's obvious where Apple is going with this. MS, I'm not so sure. I could see an almost entirely Metro "PC" for the vast majority of home users, but I can't quite imagine seeing a business environment filled with Metro apps. Maybe at some point MS will split the whole thing into two lines - one for home, one for business.

I'm completely amazed at people who keep defending this as a desktop GUI.

Yes, it's in fact a very big deal that the Start menu is now the Start screen. The operating system is called Windows for a reason, and that reason is that high-resolution, large displays can display multiple program windows concurrently.

The current Windows 7 Start menu is a program launcher and a shortcut to the file system. In a multitasking desktop OS, it is a FEATURE that this launcher only takes up roughly 1/6th of the screen. All of my already open programs contain information that I need (or I wouldn't have them open in the first place), and that information should not be hidden from me just because I want to launch another program or enter the file system.

Everything about Metro is designed for tablets, i.e. small screens with touch-only interface. Even the way Metro context menus work is abysmal using a mouse and keyboard. Instead of context menus opening under the mouse cursor, they open on a ribbon on the bottom of the screen, forcing me to move the cursor across the entire length of my display. This is ridiculously bad interface design.

I repeat, I do not understand how anyone can claim Windows 8 is workable as a desktop UI. It seems to be a fine tablet UI, but tablets are pseudo-multitasking toys.

I've tried the previews of Windows 8 (in VMs) and I don't know how I could be more disappointed. If Metro was something you could just disable, I would be completely fine. However, the "classic" desktop in 8 is a poor facsimile to a real desktop environment.

I really don't get this. Because the start menu is now full screen the entire desktop environment doesn't work anymore?

Having used the CP...I don't know how you came to that conclusion. And actually the new multi-monitor features, better task manager, new right-click menu in the bottom left hot corner etc. are all wonderful improvements to the desktop.

I agree that there's a lack of cohesiveness between Metro and "classic" and that Win8 definitely needs another layer of polish, but I see nothing but improvements to the desktop itself.

I have been using virtually all of those new features for years (and yes it is good that those are finally in a stock version of Windows) with UltraMon so that doesn't sway me. Throw in multiple desktops with VirtualWin and I have been fat and happy for quite some time.

Look, I'll freely admit that some of my dislike exists solely because it is such a new way of doing things. I remember thinking Microsoft was "so dumb" (I was a kid) for making Windows 95 like they did. Everyone resists dramatic change when they are really happy.

The desktop on 8 just feels tacked on to the rest of the experience - and maybe that won't be a bad thing. However, right now it definitely has me concerned. As someone who needs to have multiple programs open simultaneously (and none of them maximized), I am concerned with the direction Microsoft is heading in.

I guess in the long run it doesn't matter if people like Metro or not, Windows dominance is almost impossible to shift and Microsoft knows this. So they are taking advantage of that and making huge changes in the Windows UI to push their tablet and phone platforms at the expense of customer dissatisfaction on the desktop. Come on Microsoft, drop this idealistic attitude that a UI needs to be the same across all platforms. It sounds nice on paper, but in reality isn't right. I'm not some old man who is afraid of change, I would honestly welcome a little innovation in the windows space but it's pretty evident this is being done for idealistic reasons.

I could deal with everything else. Why would there not be a control panel option that just let you switch the default load into the desktop with a Win7ish Start Menu? How hard could that really have been to do? I've had the 8 Dev and now Consumer previews in VM's and have spend about 40 hours with each. I really do not care for Charms or Hot Corners at all.

I don't mind their Xbox-esque metro front page. Its fine. But give me my desktop or I'm not biting.

I've tried the previews of Windows 8 (in VMs) and I don't know how I could be more disappointed. If Metro was something you could just disable, I would be completely fine. However, the "classic" desktop in 8 is a poor facsimile to a real desktop environment.

I really don't get this. Because the start menu is now full screen the entire desktop environment doesn't work anymore?

Having used the CP...I don't know how you came to that conclusion. And actually the new multi-monitor features, better task manager, new right-click menu in the bottom left hot corner etc. are all wonderful improvements to the desktop.

I agree that there's a lack of cohesiveness between Metro and "classic" and that Win8 definitely needs another layer of polish, but I see nothing but improvements to the desktop itself.

I have been using virtually all of those new features for years (and yes it is good that those are finally in a stock version of Windows) with UltraMon so that doesn't sway me. Throw in multiple desktops with VirtualWin and I have been fat and happy for quite some time.

Look, I'll freely admit that some of my dislike exists solely because it is such a new way of doing things. I remember thinking Microsoft was "so dumb" (I was a kid) for making Windows 95 like they did. Everyone resists dramatic change when they are really happy.

The desktop on 8 just feels tacked on to the rest of the experience - and maybe that won't be a bad thing. However, right now it definitely has me concerned. As someone who needs to have multiple programs open simultaneously (and none of them maximized), I am concerned with the direction Microsoft is heading in.

Yeah, for my part maybe it was partly because I'd read so much negative press that when I got into the desktop and saw the little additions it was a very pleasant surprise. And I do tend to use the taskbar over the start menu to launch things - all the things I used to go into the start menu for are now on that little right click menu. So my personal habit may color my views.

But I don't think you really need to be that concerned. If MS was intent on deprecating the desktop over time, I don't think they'd go to the trouble of improving it in these ways right now. And I don't think they're intent on deprecating it anyway, because they still make (and will continue to make) a ton of money from people using Office or Photoshop or whatever on real computers. It seems more like we'll have the desktop and metro running in parallel, and so far (for me at least) it's pretty darn easy to avoid Metro.

I emphatically agree that the two halves don't play very nicely together, which undermines the feeling of the OS overall. And they really need to add a "skip start screen on log in" for desktop users.

Very good article. I also think it would be useful to look at why Microsoft decided to combine the their Tablet OS and Desktop OS into one system instead of creating two operating systems.

Here's what I came up with:

1) Attraction to Developers: instead of creating a completely new platform with a limited install base (like WP7), Microsoft has guaranteed that their tablet strategy will have lots of developers. Why? In roughly 2.5 years Windows 7 sold ~350 million copies. If Windows 8 sells a fraction as many they will have guaranteed developer support minimally equaling iOS levels (IMO).

2) Unification of MS Products: now that the DoJ anti-trust watch is over, Microsoft is unifying their services into one platform. Simply put, having the same design identity across all main consumer platforms makes sense (hence the iOS-ification of OSX). On the tech side, if all their products use the same SDKs (WinRT & DirectX) coding for the entire Microsoft platform becomes easier and thus more attractive.

3) Backwards Compatibility: if a user wants to purchase a tablet and still use all their old applications they purchase one of the new x86 SoCs. if they don't care, purchase an ARM tablet, ceteris paribus.

PS: on a completely different note, if you want the start button back, I'm 100% sure that there will be an app for that.

I guess in the long run it doesn't matter if people like Metro or not, Windows dominance is almost impossible to shift and Microsoft knows this. So they are taking advantage of that and making huge changes in the Windows UI to push their tablet and phone platforms at the expense of customer dissatisfaction on the desktop.

I think this is true but not quite in the way you said. Somebody goes in to a store to buy a new PC and freaks out at the interface. "Well, look, you can just go to the regular desktop by clicking it!" Relieved if annoyed, ("why do they always have to move things around?") the user walks out and uses their computer basically just as they did before.

And with that, MS adds one more to the install base for their tablets without selling a tablet. Even if the person never uses a Metro app, MS can tout all of those sales when asking devs to build Metro apps that will populate tablets.

I'd love to see the notes from the meetings at Microsoft where the idea of abandoning the multiple overlapping windows paradigm was first discussed, and then I'd like to hear what the reaction was when the decision to do so was announced. To me this is a lot like GM deciding that all future cars will have one wheel.

I'd love to see the notes from the meetings at Microsoft where the idea of abandoning the multiple overlapping windows paradigm was first discussed, and then I'd like to hear what the reaction was when the decision to do so was announced. To me this is a lot like GM deciding that all future cars will have one wheel.

At least if GM decided to go with one-wheel designs, it wouldn't cost as much to get a winter tire.

I'd love to see the notes from the meetings at Microsoft where the idea of abandoning the multiple overlapping windows paradigm was first discussed, and then I'd like to hear what the reaction was when the decision to do so was announced. To me this is a lot like GM deciding that all future cars will have one wheel.

They didn't abandon the multiple-window paradigm, though. Even in Metro you can have two windows (more than in iOS), not to mention the desktop still works....

Think of it as Win7 with a full screen start menu and an iPad emulator bolted on. They didn't take anything away as far as the rest of it goes.

I agree that they need to get rid of the extra step, but note that you can just hit a key to unlock - you don't have to slide. I'd like to have it just start reading your keypresses as a password entry (assuming valid keys) but not expecting them to make that change...

The difference I see between Apple and Microsoft is that Apple seemingly understands the simple notion that different devices require different UI interactions, while Microsoft is still stuck on this "everything is a PC" mentality. A TV is not the same a my tablet, and while the Messenger app launching in fullscreen might work for a 10" tablet or 13" laptop, launching a contact list that completely fills my 27" monitor or 60" TV will drive me insane.

If you look at the latest Mountain Lion preview, Apple has still kept iOS and OSX as completely separate operating systems. What they are bringing over however, is the APPS. Almost all of Apples first party applications have been replaced with their iPad counterparts, and it makes much more sense for developers to create an app for the iPad UI and have it run as a WINDOWED app on OSX. There are also signs of allowing iPhone applications to run as dashboard widgets, which would give Apples desktop OS the benefit of running any application built for any device in Apples ecosystem.

Dont design the OS to run everywhere on any device, design the applications themselves to run everywhere across any input method. The 2 methods completely contradict one another, and while I prefer the look of Metros UI, it does not scale well once you leave the touch interface.